, 1887-10-22
PHASES OF HUMAN CHARACTER.
Selfish People Whom We Meet Every Day
md of CourtesY.

Selfish People whom We Meet Every Day
and Everywhere-Lack of Courtesy.
There are some people who live in this
world as a cucumber grows in n garden.
They cling to their own vine and serve
no higher end than rotundity and relish.
There are others who live in the world
as a summer breeze lives in a meadow;
they find out all the hidden flowers and
set tine perfumes flying. There are 9TH
ers who live as the sea lives in a shell;
their existence is nothing but a sigh.
There are others who live as the fire lives
in a diamond; they are all sparkle. And
there are others, and they outnumber all
the rest, who live as a blind mole lives in
the soil; they see nothing, feel nothing,
suffer and enjoy a little now INC then,
perhaps, but know nothing to all eter-
nifty. Such people walk through life as
the mole walks through the glory of a
summer day, or burrows beneath the
dazzle of a winter storm. Their only in
terest is in the question, "Wherewith
hall we be clothed, and what shall we
have to eat2" Life to them is merely a
fattening process. They remind one of
prize beef at a county fair; tomorrow
brings the shambles and the butchers
ak, but in the serene content of a well
filled stall and a full stomach, they take
no thought of the future.
We meet such people every day and
everywhere. On the streets they may
see a brute tyrannizing over a helpless
beast of burden, or a mother O. yanking
a sobbing child along by the arm, as full
of ugliness herself as a thundercloud is
of electricity, or a man following an in
nocent young girl with the devil in his
heart, or a big boy ty~rannizing over a
smaller one; and they pass it all by as in
differently as the mole would sneak across
q battle field the morning after a battle.
They nave too much to do themselves to
waste time in remedying other peoples
grievances. They think too much of per-
sonal reputation to involve themselves in
IN alteration with defilers of the limo
cent, and tramplers of the weak. They
are too respectable to get mixed up in
brawls, even if the disturbance is brought
about by the DEVILS own drummers look
ing up recruits among the championless
and ~defenseless working girls, or the
p~arentless and homeless children of a
great city.
We meet them travelling through the
mountains or lettering by the sea. Their
only use for mountains is that they may
carve their precious initials on the high
est peaks, pick wintergreens and blue
berries, and display their fashionable
suits and striped stockings. They look
upon the sea as a big bathing tank, and
the sky, with all its splendor of cloud and
its glory of sunrise and sunset, as a
barometer to forecast the weather. We
meet them in business relations, and they
never believe that courtesy and business
n go together. A merchant in his of
flee or a lady in her parlor will bluntly
refuse to buy of a worn out, discouraged,
heart sick book agent. ignoring the fact
that a smile accompanying even a refusal,
acts like a spoonful of sugar in bitter tea,
and costs less. Even a lady clerk, be-
hind a counter, will be naughty and I'M
accommodating and insolent to the
woman who comes to buy, forgetful that
a customer will go a long distance out of
her way to deal with a polite and well
hammered clerk, and that, like honesty,
politeness is ever the best policy. And,
OF the other hand, a woman shopper will
be whimsical and captious and trying,
forgetting that the girl who serves her
has human blood in her veins, and often
carries a troubled heart behind her smile
or her frown.-"Amber" in Chicago
Journal.